Clawing for Air
by banjkazfan
Summary: He's not planning to hurt Charlie, but he'll be damned if he lets the other man hit him – their encounter at the bar a few days prior is still present in the form of some aches and bruises, and that was supposedly Cutter pulling his punches. Nate knows he's in a heightened state of fear now and won't be trying to pull them at all.


(A/N: I seriously cannot get enough of the relationship between Sully and Nate. Interestingly, the other characters got involved this time, too.)

* * *

Christ, he's getting too old to be crawling through caves in the Syrian citadel. Sully swears to himself as he ducks down to avoid a stalactite that drips from the rocks overhead. The fact that they're down a man – with Cutter drugged and, as Chloe eloquently put it, _tripping balls_ – is placing every nerve in his body on high alert. This was supposed to be simple, Nate had promised, but things never went the way the kid said.

From somewhere behind him, he can hear Charlie's terrified muttering to himself and deduces that he and Nate are still making their way through the narrow passage. He'd correctly assumed that Cutter was claustrophobic, and wasn't that just a bitch? Like things weren't already difficult enough, they're working with a claustrophobic man while having to crawl aren't some of the tiniest, skinniest places he'd seen in his life. Squeezing through the narrow passage was uncomfortable enough for him as it was; he can hardly imagine what Cutter was experiencing in his hypersensitive state.

He hears Nate's voice, softened to avoid scaring the other man: "Calm down, alright?" He's surprisingly good at keeping his head and talking someone down, despite his hot-headed nature that so frequently gets him into trouble. For a moment, Sully allows himself to relax as he squeezes past a particularly constricted part.

Nate, meanwhile, is trying to coax Cutter through the second passage. "Charlie, go on," he says, voice softer and a touch kinder than he's used to speaking with. "C'mon, just one more…" And damned if he doesn't know that it's not good to force someone with a phobia to confront that fear in such a head-on manner, but he knows they have no choice. He places a hand on Cutter's shoulder, intended to be both a comfort and a gentle nudge, but he quickly realizes that it was the wrong decision as Cutter rounds on him.

"I won't let you!" the other man roars, taking a swing at Nate as the treasure hunter skitters a few paces away.

The torch drops from Nate's grip as he brings his hands up into a ready position. He's not planning to hurt Charlie, but he'll be damned if he lets the other man hit him – their encounter at the bar a few days prior is still present in the form of some aches and bruises, and that was supposedly Cutter pulling his punches. Nate knows he's in a heightened state of fear now and won't be trying to pull them at all.

The air leaves Nate's body in a huff as Cutter drops down and bodily tackles him into the wall. He grunts, head spinning slightly as he brings his hands up to try and push the other man off. His hands are thus occupied when Cutter punches him in the cheek, leaving him reeling. On a positive note, it leaves his body weight thrown enough that it's easy to drop down and avoid the next punch he knows is coming. Nate throws a meager punch into Cutter's left side, not wanting to actually hurt the other man. "Stop…hitting my face!" he finally spits, feeling slightly ridiculous that _that_ is what comes out.

Cutter lurches from the punch, but is back up in an instant. Nate moves forward, planting his hands on Charlie's arms to push him away. Cutter throws his arms up, shaking Nate's hands off, and swings a vicious elbow in the younger man's direction.

Nate barely has time to think _holy shit_ as he hits the deck and throws another less-than-substantial punch. Cutter jolts backwards but rights himself with ease and Nate groans internally. Cutter's built and he had hoped to never be on the receiving end of his ire, but life seems to enjoy pissing on his parade. He keeps his hands up. "I don't want to hurt you," he says, but his words are lost on the other man. Cutter barges in for another violent, wild swing, but Nate steps aside and pushes him off-balance. Christ, it's getting harder and harder to sidestep him, but what choice does he have?

Nate drops into a crouch as Cutter punches at him once more. "I don't want to hurt you," Nate repeats, but his sentence is cut off as Charlie finally manages to pitch forward and get his fingers around his throat. There's a terrifying moment when Nate inhales sharply and finds that his air intake is severely limited, and he realizes that he is well and truly fucked.

All bets are off now as primal instinct takes over and Nate begins pushing at Cutter's face. If he could just manage to get his hand under the other man's chin, push him off-balance for just a moment –

Charlie's fingers tighten and Nate's breath comes out in panicked little noises as he scrabbles at the other man's arms. The strength leaves his body rapidly as Cutter's hands continually tighten around his throat, and Nate sinks to the ground. He grabs at Cutter's arms, but there's no strength behind it as he continues to choke for air.

There's only one thought running through his brain, all other processes shut off as his body desperately fights for that precious oxygen it needs: _Air_.

At this point, however, his mouth is running independently of that single thought. "Charlie…" he manages. "No, stop – Ch – "

Heedless of his words, Cutter continues to choke him, and Nate wonders if this is the end of the line for him. His vision begins to blacken at the corners and he knows that he is rapidly running out of time.

At that moment, he hears Sully's voice, far closer than he'd expected. "Cutter!" the older man shouts, one arm hooking around Cutter's chest as he desperately tries to pull him away. "Jesus…" he grunts, finding Charlie's grip unbreakable.

Chloe runs in, her eyes fixed on Cutter's face as she attempts to intervene. "Charlie!" she says, attempting to keep her tone calmer than the situation would appear to call for. She stands behind Nate, so close that she can feel his body heat, and reaches out for Cutter. Her hands flutter over the other man's arms; she knows that they have to do _something._

"He'll kill him!" Sully grits out through clenched teeth, still pulling for all he's worth.

Chloe ignores him for the moment, trying to insert herself into the situation. "Charlie!" she repeats, her voice a little more tense than the first time. She glances down; she feels a sense of panic hit her at the sight of Nate's frantic eyes as he continues to grab weakly at Charlie's arms.

Nate's eyes close and Chloe knows that they're running out of time. She returns her gaze to Cutter's face. "Charlie!" she says once more, desperately trying to get through to him. She's so focused on the other man that she doesn't notice at first that Sully has released him.

The cocking of a gun draws her gaze to the left, and to her horror she sees Sully in the process of aiming his gun at Cutter. "No – " she starts, reaching out a hand as if to stop the older man. "What're y-"

"Get back." His voice is incensed as he regards her with little more than a glance. If she steps back, so much the better, but if she doesn't, he will not hesitate. The light in Nate's eyes is fading, and he'll be damned before he lets anyone murder the kid – _his kid_ – right in front of him, when he has the power to do something about it.

"Don't!" Chloe pleads. It's a far cry from the cold persona she wore when telling Nate to leave Elena and Jeff behind years back, but the memory is far from her mind as she reaches out to place her hands on Cutter's face. "Charlie," she says, only a touch of desperateness to her voice, "you're killing Nate." In that moment, she can see the wild fear in his eyes, and she knows that he is responding to some unseen, terrifying stimulus. "Okay, you gotta listen to me," she says with a shake of her head, urgently trying to reason with him, " _You are killing – Nate_. _"_

Sully's finger is tensed on the trigger and he's a second away from pulling it before Cutter finally appears to snap out of his haze, seemingly aware of what he's done as he releases Nate's throat and stumbles back. The instant that Nate's freed, Sully's gun is lowered and his focus shifts to the younger man. It's still at the ready, but Sully's more concerned about Nate's life than what Cutter is doing.

Chloe kneels next to Nate, her heart in her throat as Cutter stumbles into the wall and against the floor. Nate desperately wheezes for breath, only half-aware of the eyes on him. He's coughing, which is a good sign; _you can't cough without air,_ Chloe hysterically reasons.

"Jesus…" Chloe breathes, her eyes fixed on Nate as his hand comes up to rub at his throat. It seems counterintuitive, but perhaps he's doing it as a way to reassure himself that _holy shit he's alive_.

Nate makes a noise that sounds far rougher than Sully is comfortable with, but one glance at Nate reassures him that the kid is alive. Nate continues to make sounds as if he's trying to clear his throat while Chloe reaches out to him.

"Here," she says, laying a hand on his elbow as she gently helps him to his feet. Nate continues to cough as Chloe momentarily turns to look back at Charlie, who seems to have worked the drug out of his system. He's pushing himself to his feet, so she returns her gaze to Nate. "Here, we got you," she murmurs as Nate feebly insists that he's okay.

Sully approaches, letting the kid lean on him as he unsteadily gathers his bearings. "Here we go," he breathes, feeling Nate lean more heavily on his side than on Chloe's.

"I'm all right, I'm all right," Nate asserts, stepping away from both of them. Sully's hand follows him, resting on his back as Nate attempts to stand on his own two feet. It's only a moment later when Nate, still coughing hoarsely, returns to his side, one hand lying on Sully's shoulder to steady himself. He's clearly _not_ all right, and Sully watches him worriedly as his hand slides up to Nate's shoulder. The touch is intended to steady Nate, but Sully finds that it's grounding him to this moment.

Christ, when he had said that this mission of Nate's would get the kid killed, he hadn't thought that it would happen like this.

Nate still gasps for breath as he straightens slightly; Sully's hand still rests against his back to steady him. Idly, Nate realizes that he can't remember the last time that the older man had been so clearly concerned for his well-being. Sure, Sully worries, but he hides it under jibes and Nate knows that things aren't too serious.

The silence is, unfortunately, a sign that things were _way_ too close for comfort and that Nate had truly been about to die.

Sully and Chloe watch carefully as Nate begins to walk forward and Cutter approaches. Sully's hand is halfway to raising his gun before Cutter speaks. "Nate. Nate, Nate, I'm really sorry," he says, sounding fearful of what he's done. He remembers, clearly, and it's eating at him. He approaches, but wisely keeps his hands off of Nate as he repeats himself. "I'm sorry – " To everyone's surprise, Nate responds by idly patting Charlie's shoulder.

Slightly less surprising is that Nate pushes Charlie away, a little less gently than polite touching calls for.

Nate rasps out his thoughts on the subject as he bends to pick up the torch.

" _We're even._ "

* * *

(A/N: Thank you for checking out my work! Please feel free to leave any comments/suggestions/what have you. I'm planning for this to be a mini-series wherein I overanalyze cutscenes and comments.)


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